nVidia reports lower revenue, loss – but renaming the products works

nVidia reported several interesting things in its financial report for fiscal first quarter 2010 [1Q’2009 in conventional way]. Revenue shrunk from $1.2 billion a year ago to $664.2 million, a 42% decrease. Quarter-on-Quarter, nVidia actually saw growth of 38%, meaning that IT industry is slowly but certainly exiting the recession.

This is significantly higher than Wall Street expected – most of the pre-announcements we got estimated sales at around 530-540 million, but in the end, sales were $130 million more. Loss was $201.3 million, but the actual loss was 61.1 million – nVidia’s financial guys decided to buy back stock from its employees for $140.2 million. Still, this resulted in a 7.2% loss on the NASDAQ.

Its recent game with renaming the GeForce 9600/9800 series to GT120/130/GTS250 paid back handsomely, with nVidia reducing the inventory to just 64 days – down from 144 days of unsold stock. This is the reason why the company increased orders with TSMC and UMC, an interesting change from the downshift on production in 4Q’2008. Apple business is also nothing to be sneezed at, since it is showing continuous growth. To make the matters more interesting, nVidia pre-announced one of Apple’s products, but the company doesn’t want to go into details after a certain nVidia exec slipped up his tongue and spill the beans on nVidia powered Apple TV box.

The company also gained market share in the discrete desktop GPU segment, taking 69% of the market. Most of that share was taken on AMD’s expense, who obviously failed to capitalize on sales for the Radeon 4000 series. We learned what the problem is from ATI partners, and we’ll bring you a special article about what’s going on with both of companies. Looking into the crystal ball, David White [nVidia CFO] claimed that the company expects a 5% growth to around 697-700 million US, and hoping to achieve a profit.

We also learned of several interesting products that nVidia has in store for Computex, and it is quite possible that these products add significant amount of $$$ in Q3 and Q4 sales, especially in the entry-level mobile computing section. There is a big announcement coming, but we’re not exactly sure who will be the big partner for a Tegra-based $99-199 MID-netbook crossover. There are a number of usual suspects, so expect Dell, HP or Acer. We doubt that Apple would announce a Google Android based product.

About the AuthorTheo Valich

Focused on creating synergy between various industries, creating next-gen solutions.Passionate about the new and emerging technologies. Work experience spans from game development and event organizing, editing magazine and on-line publications to aerospace development.Specialties: Team Leadership / Management / Technical Consultant / Funding.Enjoys travelling around the world and meeting new people. :)